A pathologic diagnosis is generally done by a pathologist through looking at a preparation on a slide glass under a microscope. However, the view field of a microscope is limited, so that it is necessary to examine every nook and corner of the preparation by changing the examining areas in order to examine it thoroughly. For this, used instead of the microscope is an image scanner of a type which captures the slide as an electronic image.
In that case, at the maximum, it is the resolution of a monitor of PC (personal computer) which corresponds to the view field of the microscope. However, unless the tissue is small and the magnification at the time of display is small, the entire area size of the tissue becomes several tens or several hundreds of times of the resolution of the monitor of the PC.
With pathologic diagnoses, diagnosis results are not necessarily decided according to the entire tissue. The diagnosis results are influenced by a partial area of a tissue image in many cases.
Further, different aspects may be observed in areas distant from the tissue. Thus, it is efficient to divide the tissue into areas of a specific segment and to perform processing for diagnosis, so that the processing can be stopped at the point where the diagnosis result is decided.
Therefore, to divide a biological (pathologic) tissue image on which a biological tissue is captured into rectangular blocks and to diagnose each block is disclosed in a method disclosed in Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication Hei 06-003601, for example.
Further, in a case where an electronic image is transmitted via a communication, e.g., a case of conducting a telediagnosis, dividing a pathologic tissue image into rectangular pieces is often considered in terms of a transmission efficiency.
However, the processing efficiency is limited when a diagnosis is done by simply dividing a pathologic tissue image as the diagnosis target of a pathologic analysis into rectangular pieces and diagnosing each of the divided rectangular image pieces by a mechanical procedure and order (e.g., from upper left to lower right).
Further, for example, relations regarding a focused divisional area as a diagnosis target within a pathologic tissue image and neighboring areas that are neighboring to the focused divisional area vertically, laterally, etc., are considered important in an image diagnosis in some cases. Thus, as described above, in a case where a detailed diagnosis is conducted in a mechanical order, not only the diagnosis efficiency is poor but also information acquired from the area over different blocks and acquired from the entire image is overlooked.
As a related technique thereof, disclosed is a method which employs a transmitter-side and a receiver-side image communication devices, in which the transmitter-side image communication device sets the priority for each of divided images acquired by dividing an original image, and conducts transmission/reception of each of the divided images while increasing the image data amount of the divided image with a high priority to be large and reducing the image data amount of the divided image with a low priority to be small, thereby conducting an image communication with high transmission efficiency (Patent Document 1).
Further, as a related technique thereof, disclosed is a method which sets the priority for each of divided images acquired by dividing a captured eyeground image and sets the order for displaying each of the divided images based on the priority so as to shorten the diagnosis time (Patent Document 2).
Furthermore, as a related technique thereof, disclosed is a method which sets an index showing the significance for each of a large number of pieces of image data and adds the value of the index every time a processing work for each of the image data is executed so as to make it easy to select the image data of a high utility value (Patent Document 3).
Patent Document 1: Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication 2005-057494
Patent Document 2: Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication 2006-102097
Patent Document 3: Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication 2007-135065
Patent Document 4: Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication 2006-121578
However, as described above, different aspects may sometimes be observed between the tissue areas of distant parts within the pathologic tissue image. Therefore, with the related information disclosed in Patent Documents 1, 2, and 3, it is possible that the information acquired from the entire image is overlooked.
Further, for example, relations regarding a focused divisional area as a diagnosis target within a pathologic tissue image and neighboring areas that are neighboring to the focused divisional area vertically, laterally, etc., are considered important in an image diagnosis in some cases. Therefore, with the methods such as the related techniques disclosed in Patent Documents 1, 2, and 3 which allot the index values to each of the divided images, the image diagnosis efficiency becomes poor.
Further, in a case where it is required to transmit a pathologic tissue image by a communication for a telediagnosis or the like, there is a possibility of having a situation where the diagnosis cannot be done until the transmission of the part (image area) important for the diagnosis is completed. In the meantime, there is also a possibility of having a situation where it is required to wait for the image area that is not required to conduct a detailed diagnosis, i.e., the image area that is not highly important. Therefore, the entire pathologic diagnosis efficiency becomes poor.
It is an object of the present invention to provide a pathologic image diagnostic system which outputs a pathologic tissue image, a pathologic image diagnostic method, and a pathologic image diagnostic program, which make it possible to improve the inconveniences of the related techniques and to conduct the image diagnosis efficiently.